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Research has identified three broad categories of advanced manufacturing technologies (AMT): design, manufacturing, and administrative. The measures presented here, based on the initial categorization of Adler (1988), have been used in a variety of research. These measures exist and continue to be used for several reasons. First, these measures have good psychometric properties. The items for each category tend to have very strong reliabilities that have been replicated across multiple studies. In addition there is strong evidence of construct validity because the measures converge and diverge as expected. However, measures such as these that tap the level of investment in a technology as being from low to high suffer from some shortcomings. In particular, the subjective nature of such likert scale items sacrifices a degree of specificity for greater generalizability.

Manufacturing AMTs are actual production technologies such as flexible manufacturing systems, computer numerical control, and group technology. These manufacturing technologies have been presented as a way to revolutionize the shop floor, to move from economies of scale to economies of scope.